Set up recurring sales receipt in QuickBooks Online

Learn how to set up a recurring sales receipt for monthly charges for credit card or ACH.

Visa and MasterCard guidelines require you to have written authorization from your customer before setting up recurring credit billing.

Access the credit card authorization form

Simply fill out the recurring template. Make sure that the Payment Method is selected as the customer’s default credit card or Bank account and you have your customer’s form and keep it in a secure file. When you save the recurring template the form will come up automatically.

Create a recurring sales receipt for monthly charges

Enter a Template Name, which helps identify what the template is for (this won't be seen on the transaction).

From the Type drop-down choose Scheduled.

Choose the customer’s name from the Customer drop-down and verify the Email that populates.Note: If you would like for your customer to receive an email notification every time their payment is processed, make sure to check Automatically send emails.

Check - Select the Authorization hyperlink to provide your customer with the Bank Transfer Authorization Form. Check the box to ensure the payment will process each time a form is created using this recurring transaction.

Select Save template at the bottom right when you’re finished.

If you are processing a credit card, the Automatic Credit Card Billing Authorization Form will be generated for your customer to fill out. Ask your customer to fill out the form, sign it, and return it to you before the first recurring charge happens.

For your protection, we recommend keeping the signed form in a safe place for 18 months after the final charge takes place.

Note: If you use the
Days in advance to create option when setting up a sales receipt for a recurring charge, the charge will process on the date the transaction is created, not on the transaction date. For example, a sales receipt that recurs on the 15th of each month, if created 10 days in advance, will process the credit card charge on the 5th of the month.

Know if you set it up correctly

In the list for recurring transactions, you will see the following list items with the Credit Card icon if the recurring transaction is set up correctly.